I'm writing a play, actually

Love Actually director Richard Curtis is ready to trade the silver screen for a career in theatre, he revealed yesterday.

The writer is to interrupt a run of romantic comedies such as Four Weddings And A Funeral, Notting Hill and Bridget Jones's Diary to tackle a play about his parents' illness.

Curtis, 47, says his decision to pen his first stage script may be due to a 'mid-term career crisis'. He added: 'I'm at a strange point in my career where I don't know what my next film may be.'